Mark Dayton leads Tom Emmer by 9% in new poll

DFLer Mark Dayton leads Republican Tom Emmer in the race for governor by 9 percentage points in a Star Tribune opinion poll released over the weekend.

With one exception, that result continues Dayton's pattern of beating or tying Emmer for the lead since statewide polling began earlier this year.

Independent Tom Horner remaining in third place with a small but growing share of approval.

That exception came last week in a Rasmussen poll that gave Emmer a single percentage point lead over Dayton. And that narrow lead was well within the poll's margin of error. (See below.)

Not surprisingly, when the Strib released its results, rightbloggers immediately blasted it as biased. And Team Emmer insisted the situation remains a "competitive race."

The Strib and leftbloggers saw a different explanation: Cell phone users, who are thought to be more likely to vote Democratic. Rasmussen excluded cell phone users from its survey, while the Strib included them.

Here are the results of statewide polls so far (undecideds make up the balance to reach 100 percent in each hypothetical race):